


The Worst Thing Ever

by Artemis1000



Category: Original Work
Genre: Alien Biology, Alien Romance, Alien/Human Relationships, Cynicism, Eggpreg, F/M, Humor, Oviposition - offscreen, Science Fiction, Tentacles, Treat, human/non-human - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-19
Updated: 2018-02-19
Packaged: 2019-03-04 01:27:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,355
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13353624
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Artemis1000/pseuds/Artemis1000
Summary: Ryan just wanted to make some easy money by selling his body as a host for Gomassi eggs. Easy, uncomplicated, no attachments. He would get paid for eating chicken wings and watching TV! He sure never counted on Kyr becoming a part of his life, or for him to start caring for anything beyond his paycheck.





	The Worst Thing Ever

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Snickfic](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Snickfic/gifts).



When he had signed up as a host, it hadn’t been because he wanted to create beautiful new life or build a bridge between their species or any of the other flowery advertisement slogans, Ryan had simply didn’t have a better use of his time.

The fact was, nobody else would pay you such a pretty sum for what was basically sitting around on your ass and watching TV all day while you stuffed your face with chicken wings. You were, in fact, expressly encouraged to stuff your face with chicken wings since the critters in your belly needed nutrition.

…you should probably not call them _critters_. At least not where the Office for Gomassi Relations employees could hear you.

“I have always been passionate about Human-Gomassi relations,” he told the stern salt-and-pepper-haired lady with the hawkeyes.  “It would be an honor to do my part to bring our worlds closer together.” He shrugged a little, tugging at the hem of the nice shirt he had bought just for this interview. “We humans have got to do our part for the Alliance, right? It’s not like we’ve got weapons of doom or impressive FTL drives. But our bodies are uniquely suited to breeding. So…” Another lazy shrug.

All he got was a deeply disapproving, “hm” and Ryan wilted in his chair.

So much for getting paid to marathon all 27 seasons of _Space Hospital_.

 

Three weeks later, he received a message from the _Office for Gomassi Relations – Breeding Program_ which he promptly ignored since he didn’t need a rejection to be the cherry on top of his already shitty day.

Ryan didn’t read it until a week later, which left him with exactly two days to put his life on hiatus for at the very least the next three months, possibly up to six. He put everything he owned in storage, it wasn’t like he was attached to his current dingy quarters on a slowly-rusting space station, and told himself he was lucky that he didn’t have anyone to say goodbye to. It made things easier and he’d always liked easy, hadn’t he?

 

The breeding clinic he was assigned to turned out to be a space station deep in Gomassi space; the trip alone proved worth the entire ordeal. He’d never have been able to afford to see the Rik Nebula or the Ice Rings of Gomas VII.

There were more medical examinations and instructional videos and instructional one-on-one chats to ensure that the hosts truly knew what they were getting into before they gave their final consent. These were followed by more pre-impregnation discussions and while Ryan didn’t think he learned anything truly new, all that time spent with Gomassans sure helped him grow used to being in the company of the tentacled aliens.

Back home on his colony station in the orbit of Jupiter, Ryan hadn’t run into many Gomassans. There were more often found on earth or Mars or other places which actually mattered, or at least warranted a name instead of just an identification number.

When he had first applied, he had wondered if his quite average looks would become an obstacle, considering the _breeding_ part of the breeding program. He thought his brown eyes looked rather nice in the right light and he liked the stubble on his chin, even his dark hair which nearly brushed his shoulders when he didn’t tie it back in a messy ponytail, but it wasn’t like he would ever live up to the humans on the covers of tentacle erotica.

These concerns struck him as silly now. While the Gomassans had a roughly humanoid shape, complete with a head, from which masses of the writhing tentacles they were best known for sprouted,  they were far too alien to get hung up on his nose being a little crooked or his knees too knobby. Human beauty standards were probably as foreign to their large pupil-less eyes as theirs were to him.

He tried to ignore that he still hadn’t met the Gomas he would be breeding with, or how antsy that made him. Everyone else in his group had been introduced to their partner or knew them previously, and there were two actual couples giddy to get started on their family planning.

But Ryan liked it easy, uncomplicated, no attachments, it was for the best that he’d ended up with someone who saw it as a mere transaction just like he did.

 

In the end, it _was_ easy.

His Gomas didn’t arrive until her eggs were already overripe for oviposition, so there was no awkward first meeting, no stilted small talk, just a dimly lit room and a pool filled with the thick, swampy water to which Gomassans liked to return for breeding.

It wasn’t anywhere near as life-changing as the erotica made it out to be but it didn’t hurt when the tentacles entered him and placed the eggs deep within him and, well, it was a transaction. If you wanted mind-blowing tentacle sex there were better places to look than a breeding clinic.

 

He had made it to season 4 of _Space Hospital_.

The doorbell ringing yanked Ryan out of his doze and he leaped up from the couch, then yelped as he stumbled over his abandoned shoes and barely managed to keep himself from faceplanting into the glass table.

Fuck, he sure hoped the critters wouldn’t be inheriting his clumsiness. Could you get sued for that?

He padded over, one hand trying to smooth his hair into something which didn’t resemble bedhead quite so much, considering it was three in the afternoon, while the other hid his yawn.

Unsurprisingly, it was a Gomas on the other side of the door.

Surprisingly, her head tentacles were moving around in agitation like Ryan had rarely seen before.

A jolt shot through Ryan. The mottled pattern on her brownish-green skin was distinct, he would never forget it. He’d had these head tentacles all over his face just two days ago.

“You’re still here.”

“I am.”

The Gomas slipped past him with a fluid grace which needed a lot more than two legs to let you more float than walk, but then she seemed to lose her nerve halfway to claiming his couch and just stood there, her leg tentacles frozen to stiffness.

Ryan lingered by the door, his arms equally still at his sides.

On TV, the sweet-natured Nautin nurse discovered that she had contracted a deadly disease while caring for a dying lizard alien.

Ryan swallowed hard. “So. I guess you’re here to check on the…” _Don’t say critters_ , he reminded himself. _Just don’t say critters_. “…kids.”

He nearly flinched at his choice of words. He pointedly did not like to think of the alien eggs nesting and growing within his body as kids, or as people, or as anything at all. They were just some things which happened to be in there and would eventually cause him some minor inconveniences, like a very long-lasting case of indigestion.

“I am.”

Ryan tentatively padded closer, his hands went down to fiddle with the hem of his shirt. He gave himself a mental kick and pulled it up to reveal his smooth, flat belly. “Nothing to see yet. I…” His throat felt tight again, he choked it down. This was no time to make things weird. “I don’t feel anything, but the doctors said I won’t before week three.”

Kyr stepped closer, one of her thinner body tentacles tentatively reached out, but she hesitated before making contact with his stomach.

“Five, right?” Ryan asked, just to break the silence. He had been kind of out of it during the end, but he hadn’t been so out of it not to know the number of eggs.

“Five.”

Kyr withdrew her tentacle and the silence returned.

She was the one to break it this time, with a murmur of, “I’m sorry. I should have spoken to you beforehand. I was informed it was… _inconsiderate_ to arrive just in time for breeding.”

“Don’t worry about it.” Ryan gave another of his careless shrugs, his fingers once again twisting into the hem of his shirt. “It’s not the freakiest thing I’ve done for money.” He forced out a bark of laughter. “Hey, I mean, I’ve worked retail on Black Friday!”

She made a bubbling noise which he had learned meant confusion in her species.

Ryan looked longingly at his TV. This was exactly the kind of awkwardness he’d already thought successfully avoided.

“Are you going to be here for much longer?”

She hesitated before bobbing her head, her entire body rippling with the motion. “I wasn’t planning to, but there are problems since I kept the eggs too long. The doctors want to keep me under supervision until they’re certain this won’t remain my only clutch.”

So that meant she’d be here to watch her eggs grow in him, and that she was here at all probably meant she planned to take an interest in them even before hatching. “Yeah… yeah… Okay.”

Not okay. Not at all okay.

 

Kyr took an interest in the lives growing in him, yet she seemed equally discomfited by the intimate bond between them as Ryan was.

Their meetings remained short and stilted, conversations which never moved beyond polite inquiries after another’s health. Two weeks in he still didn’t know more about her than her name and that she was growing increasingly annoyed with being stuck here.

Yet she kept returning for more stilted conversation and embarrassing silences and Ryan couldn’t help his growing admiration for her stubbornness.

It kind of, maybe, wasn’t even the worst, having her over every second day. Maybe he’d kind of started to look forward to it, if only to break the monotony of his days.

They found common ground slowly but steadily, sharing little pieces of themselves, crossing the divide between them inch by inch.

Kyr, he learned, hadn’t been eager to spawn, but she was the only fertile female in her clan, and they desperately needed the young.  She despised that her species was wholly dependent on other sentient lifeforms to procreate. Yet she didn’t despise Ryan.

He, in turn, confessed that he was only here for the money. She laughed and told him that it was fitting for them to be matched, but she wouldn’t elaborate.

“You can see the bulge,” he said all of a sudden one day, while he sat sprawled on the couch and Kyr was awkwardly perched on the armrest. It wasn’t because he wouldn’t move, couches just weren’t suited for Gomassi anatomy. There wasn’t a whole lot that was equally suited to both of them.

Ryan lifted his shirt, looking down himself. His stomach was swollen, the skin not yet mottled and bruised like it’d be later on, but. “I’m starting to feel there are foreign objects in there when I bend over or crouch.”

This time Kyr touched his belly. Her tentacle felt warm and soft, a little bit damp but not unpleasantly slick as he’d expected, just… alien. As alien as everything about her and the creatures within him was.

She shifted closer, a second tentacle joined the first in her eager inspection before she suddenly drew back, as if she had only just realized what she was doing.

“I’ve never seen a human host carry,” she said quietly. “Humans didn’t carry for us yet when my clan last had young. Does it hurt you?”

“No. They said it might, later on, but right now it’s just starting to get uncomfortable.” His voice remained even for the most part, but, well, he didn’t really like to think too much about the late phase.

There was a reason why hosts were paid a hefty sum for their troubles.

She gave him a sharp look. “Aren’t you bored stuck inside all day, just waiting for the eggs to grow?”

“I could leave my room, it’s not like I’m locked in.” He shrugged. “But this entire space station is one giant hospital. What’s there to see?”

“You don’t have to stay on this station.”

Another lazy shrug. “Yeah, sure, and then? I don’t know anything or anyone out there.”

“Now that’s just sad. I’m not going to have my young carried by a sad mammal.” Kyr rose to her full height. “We’re going out.”

Ryan’s jaw dropped in protest, but the tentacle yanking at his wrist made it clear that this was non-negotiable.

 

Kyr had a ship.

Kyr had a small, fast little ship which looked armed to the teeth even to Ryan’s clueless eyes and she navigated it through the traffic around Imor IV with deft skill, even if she seemed to be hellbent on…

“Stop! Stop!” he howled, “We’re going to crash into that fucking huge carrier! Do you hear me? We’re going to crash!”

“No, we won’t,” Kyr told him cheerfully and pushed the throttle all the way.

Clinging to the co-pilot’s chair – it wasn’t actually shaped so a human could sit in it – Ryan squeezed his eyes shut and braced himself for a fiery death.

Death didn’t come.

“Told you they’d move out of the way,” Kyr said smugly. Her head tentacles were swaying. “Are all humans as skittish as you?”

He blinked at her. “Nah. That’s just me being a coward.”

Kyr got up from her perch and moved towards him, her head tentacles still swaying. Ryan kind of wanted to reach for them, and wondered how it would feel if she curled them coyly around his fingers like he’d seen other Gomassans do with their human partners.

She bobbed her head. “Ah. I see. Is this a bad time to tell you I believe in confronting your fears head-on?”

Ryan felt his heart rate, just recovered, speed up again. He heroically stifled a whimper. “Yes. This is a really bad time to tell me.”

Chicken wings weren’t worth it, and if Kyr had her way, he would never finish his 27 seasons of _Space Hospital_.

But she curled a tentacle around his wrist and pulled him towards her and maybe that wouldn’t be the worst thing ever.


End file.
